Koch groups visit Nashville to back school vouchers

Panelists assembled by the Charles Koch Institute discuss in Nashville Tuesday what they say is a need to expand school choice in Tennessee. From left to right: Stephanie Linn, state programs and government relations director of the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice; Jonathan Butcher, education director of the Goldwater Institute; Steve Perry, principal of Capital Preparatory Magnet School in Connecticut; and Justin Owen, president and CEO of the Beacon Center of Tennessee.
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Recognizing Tennessee's widespread focus on education, two organizations led by one of the conservative Koch brothers stopped by Nashville Tuesday night and gave a platform to speakers who promoted an option this state still lacks — school vouchers.

Letting parents use public dollars to attend private school quickly emerged as a leading remedy to solve education performance woes during a Charles Koch Institute-backed panel talk Tuesday featuring heads of right-leaning think tanks and a Connecticut high school.

Tennessee has a robust charter school program, a panel of four noted and applauded, but proposals for school vouchers have annually stalled, defying the political make-up of its state government.

"You have a Republican governor, a supermajority of Republicans who typically vote vouchers and yet you don't have a voucher program," said Steve Perry, principal of Capital Preparatory Magnet School in Connecticut. "I'm confused.

"You say you want choice, and then you don't pull the lever to make the choice happen," he told a room of around 100 mostly sympathizers but several skeptics as well gathered at the downtown Renaissance Nashville Hotel. "You're the ones who have the power to make the change that needs to be made."

Billionaires Charles Koch and his bother David Koch are scorned nationally by liberals for their willingness to pump their money into conservative political causes. A representative of the Charles G. Koch Foundation didn't say when asked whether some sort of financial play could be in store for Tennessee with vouchers.

Brennan Brown, program officer with the Charles Koch Foundation, said the lone focus of Tuesday's event was to start "a conversation" on educational opportunities.The Nashville forum fell under the group's Well-Being Initiatives and followed others in Oklahoma City, Atlanta and Austin, Texas.

Some were there to offer a counter view. T.C. Weber, a Metro Nashville school parent, questioned the "end game" of diverting funding from public schools.

"Are you looking to destroy the public system that we already have and build a new one based on your ideas?"

Panelists included representatives of the Indianapolis-based Friedman Foundation for Education Choice and the Arizona-based Goldwater Institute, along with Nashville's Beacon Center of Tennessee.

"Right now, a ZIP code determines where your child goes to schools, and frankly, I think that is pathetic," Beacon Center CEO Justin Owen said. "We need to empower parents to make those choices."

Gov. Bill Haslam has supported a voucher system that would be limited largely to low-income students zoned for struggling schools in Memphis and Nashville, but legislation last year again stalled in the House committee.

State Lawmakers in attendance Tuesday included included state Sen. John Stevens, R-Huntingdon, Rep. Steve McDaniel, R-Parkers Crossroads and Sen. Brian Kelsey, R-Germantown, who has sponsored voucher bills in the past and said he would "take another crack at it next year."

If it passes, Kelsey said it would be because of Tennesseans, but that he's happy to have interest from other states. "I wasn't aware until this particular event that the Charles Koch Institute was even interested in this issue at all."

Other notable names were there as observers. They included Lisa Quigley, chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Nashville; Lee Harrell, lobbyist for the Tennessee School Boards Association and Bob Bogen, former Metro councilman and ex-director of the Metro Nashville Education Association.